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Very often was emphasized.
We need to look through our head.
And we have that developed for us in Colossians chapters one and two particularly, where we have the headship of our Lord Jesus Christ over us, and it presents to us his worthiness.
For that place, as well as those things in US which will strengthen.
Are looking to the head and those things that we have in danger of weakening.
Are looking to the head because that was the particular problem that was in Colossae at that time. The Saints were losing.
The sense of the looking for the head and submitting to the head Christ think it's also in one way connected with the fact that on our schedule card quotes from that it's not very fortunate that in all things he might have.
The preeminence.
I would suggest we begin in chapter one, but try to.
Uh, pace ourselves, if that's a word that Jim would like. Pace ourselves in such a way we make sure we get into the second chapter as well in our meetings.
Colossians, Chapter One.
Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Timotheus our brother to the Saints and faithful brethren in Christ which are at colossi. Grace be unto you in peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Praying always for you since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus.
And of the love which ye have to all the Saints, for the hope which is laid up for you in heaven. For of ye heard before in the word, of the truth of the gospel, which has come unto you as it is in all the world. And bring it forth fruit as it does also in you, since the day you heard of it and knew the grace of God. And truth, as you also learned of Epifras, our dear fellow servant, who is for you a faithful minister of Christ.
Who also declared unto us your love in the spirit.
For this 'cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that you might be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding.
That you might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing fruit, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God, strengthened with Almighty according to His glorious power unto all patience and long-suffering with joyfulness. Giving thanks unto the Father, which has made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the Saints in life, who have delivered us from the power of darkness and have translated us into the Kingdom of His dear Son.
In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins. Who is the image of the invisible God, the first born of every creature. For by Him were all things created that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrown or dominions.
Our principalities, our powers, all things were created by Him and for Him, and He is before all things, and by Him all things consist. And He is the Head of the Body, the Church, who is the beginning, the first one from the dead, that in all things He might have the preeminence. For it please the Father, that in Him should all fullness dwell, and having made peace through the blood of His Cross, by Him to reconcile all things unto Himself.
By him I say, whether they be things on earth or things in heaven.
And you that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath He reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy, and unblameable, and unreprovable in His sight, if he continue in the faith grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel which he have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven whereof I fall, and made a minister who now rejoice in my sufferings for you.
00:05:26
And fill out that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh, for His body's sake, which is the Church, whereof I am made a minister according to the dispensation of God, which is given to me for you to fulfill the Word of God. Even the mystery which has been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to His Saints, to whom God would make known. What is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles?
Which is Christ in you, the hope of glory, whom we preach, warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom.
That we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus, Where unto I also labor, striving according to his working, which worketh in me mightily.
I.
John chapter one, Colossians chapter one, and Hebrews chapter one are three high points in scripture.
To bring before us the person.
Of God's Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.
And the greatness of that person.
And in this particular Colossians 1.
There is emphasis given.
To Himself as the one that God has placed in the position of Supreme Head.
Overall.
And his rightness to be that head.
That first born place that is his. And so it's well for us to.
Have the knowledge.
Grow in our souls of the person.
The greatness of the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And it's in the measure in which that right place of his person is held in our hearts.
Than recognized in our souls that we will love to him practically.
For every need within the assembly and even in our personal lives as well.
So this first chapter begins and brings out to us.
The greatness of the person who is worthy to be happy and who is happy and given that place by God.
Subject doesn't particularly start until down around the 1213 versus but not.
Completely sketched first verses of the chapter, but not to give them a great amount of emphasis so that we don't get into the.
Main subject, if you will, of his headship.
Ephesians is alike Colossians in a lot of verses, but it is more what Christ is, what, uh, the church is to Christ as the body.
And uh, it does speak about the Lord Jesus as head of the body, but here in Colossians the emphasis, like you say, Don, is more on Christ as the head and it is important to have our souls occupied with the glory of that person.
And in the measure that we will, we'll be delivered from the systems that men have created to look to this man and that man who may be gifted, but they're not the ones that guide, they're not the ones to direct. It's this person that we're talking about. You mentioned in versus 13141516 through 18.
00:10:02
It's interesting in those verses we have.
Him first born in two spheres versus the 15 through 17. It's the first creation, is the first born of every creature that is in relation to the first creation. But in verses 18 and 19, he's the first born in new creation, and it is helpful to see that in both spheres.
The Lord Jesus is the one that has the preeminence.
Sometimes, put it this way, in making the contrast that Bob has just made between Ephesians and Colossians, and that is that in Ephesians you might say a head without a body is incomplete. And it's a tremendous thing, isn't it, to think that the Lord Jesus as the ascended Christ, the head of the body is incomplete without his body here on earth, the church. And so as you say, he's head over all things to the church, which is His body.
But here in Colossians, it's more a body without out, a head being incomplete. We don't want to be mundane and connected with explaining these things, but we can think of it in connection with a natural body. A head without a body is incomplete, and a body without a head is incomplete. If you sever the head from the body, neither are going to function properly. And that's really what we learn in taking up these two epistles.
But here, more specifically in Colossians, what he's really saying is that we, as the members of the body of Christ on earth, cannot function properly unless we take our direction from the body. And how do we do that? Well, on the day of Pentecost, the Spirit of God descended and a number of things happened. One, the Spirit of God came to indwell each individual.
Our bodies individually are the temple of the Holy Ghost. 2 The Spirit of God came to dwell in the church collectively on earth. And that's one of the things that is unique to the Christian era is the abiding presence of the Spirit of God collectively amongst the people of God here on earth. But the Spirit of God also linked those members of the body, those who were waiting in obedience to the word of the Lord.
About 120 of them, the Spirit of God linked them to their glorified head, the Lord Jesus Christ. And it's interesting when you go through the acts that sometimes when they went to make decisions in the early church in the assembly, it says and the Spirit said no, it was no doubt through some, some brothers, some in human instruments, but they got their direct, got their instructions so directly.
From their glorified head through the Spirit that the Word of God records and the Spirit said they were whole, practically holding the head just before we go on to if, if to me at least, and there may be other thoughts, but to my own soul, in seeking to pick out a key verse or phrase in this epistle that might sum up the epistle because it's always helpful to pick out a key verse or phrase in a chapter or a book.
That sums it up, gives an outline, and for my own soul I like what it says. Or I'll just point out what it says at the end of the 11Th verse of chapter 3. Read this to Mr. Darby's translation. Christ is everything.
That's really, isn't it? What this epistle is about. Christ is everything he's He's the head of the body. He's the one that's seated at God's right hand. He's the one that the Spirit of God would direct our attention to.
He's the one from whom we ought to take our instruction, both individually and collectively as members of the body of Christ. Brethren, there's nothing else. There's no one else you notice coming in the room this afternoon. It says it's all about you.
Brethren, it's not all about us, it's all about Christ. Christ is everything. And if we can, as Dawn has suggested in taking up these this portion, if we can get that before our soul. And as Doug brought before us earlier in connection with being gathered to the Lord's name and having Christ before us and what Christ says and how He directs, what his direction is through the Spirit.
00:15:17
Then I believe we will get a blessing from these meetings this weekend.
Just a few words on the beginning of the chapter.
Notice.
In verse four it says the apostle Paul had seen in the Saints in Colossi mentioned three things in connection with it that I want to note. The first one is in verse four, your faith in Christ Jesus. The second one in the same verse, the love.
Would you have to all the Saints in verse five, the hope which is laid out for you? Those are the three characteristics of normal Christianity given great emphasis in First Thessalonians, where you have a new assembly and new believers. Those three things should characterize the life of a Christian, as we call them, of a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. His life is to be characterized by faith.
By hope and by love.
And connected with it were brought into it in verse five, the word of the truth of the gospel. And so when we talk of the headship of Christ, the assumption we're starting with is.
The recognition in our souls that he is having.
He is head as it brings out of all creation, so whether we recognize it or not, he has a headship place over everything that is created. And so it's true of everyone in that way, believer or unbeliever.
Even the animal creation, the angelic creation, and so on all come under His headship and it's broadest sense. But for us, through the truth of the Gospel were brought into the realization of the relationship and it's to be practiced with faith, hope, and love in our lives. And then just one other point to notice in the introductory, and that's in verse 6.
It says since the day you heard of it and knew the grace of God in truth. And so we trust that each one of us who have brought into this relationship with God where we have faith and love and hope and live in that since we heard the truth of the gospel that we also recognized were brought into it.
The source of it was not ourselves.
The source that began that work that has brought us to where we were and are at the beginning of the the book, if you will, is the work of God. And grace is the God of grace that did work to bring us out of a state of unbelief, out of state of selfish self-interest in which love did not exist, and from a state in which we had no real hope.
We were of people without hope. The.
Limit of our thoughts and hopes was in this life only, but now we have that which links us to heaven in the person of our head through the Holy Spirit and has brought us into a totally different, wonderful, newly enjoyed relationship with our head.
Speaking of Christ and how it's brought out in this epistle, it is beautiful in these opening verses to see how often he speaks of Christ and uses that name or title. They were the faithful brethren in Christ. We get that in the second verse. He we give thanks in the third verse to God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. He uses the full title and then he says in verse four he speaks of Christ Jesus.
00:20:03
And then it's beautiful to see that we have this man, Epifras, who was a faithful minister. It doesn't say of the gospel that was no doubt true. It doesn't say with the faithful minister of the truth that was no doubt true as well. But he was a faithful minister of Christ.
When Epifross ministered to the Saints in colossi, he ministered Christ. And brethren, isn't that what we need? In the day in which we live? We often speak of the truth and holding the truth and so on, and that's certainly very true and very important. But we need to be seek to be faithful ministers of Christ, to bring before the Saints the person, and later on in the Epistle as he goes on.
As Paul goes on to speak of Christ, where is Christ he's at the right hand of God and we are to set our minds there. We're to be occupied not with Christ so much as he walked here in this world. There's other scriptures that would teach us to have Christ before us as the perfect example in the man and so on. But that's not what we have in Colossians. It's Christ where he is now and the relationship we have with him now. But if you notice in verse seven he says as.
He also learned.
From Epipras, our fellow Mr. Darby's translation. From Epifras, our dear fellow servant. What did they learn from Epiprass? They learned of Christ. He was a faithful minister of Christ. Then when Epiprass spoke to the Apostle and others of the Saints, what did he speak of? The shortcomings of the Saints, their faults, their idiosyncrasies.
Now we find from these verses, he spoke of what he saw in the Saints of Christ as a result of the work of the Spirit of God. I hang my head, brethren. It's a good lesson for myself. I can't point the finger anywhere else. And brethren, if we seek to be faithful ministers of Christ and as we speak of one another to one another, to speak of those things of Christ that we see in others.
I believe that it will bind us together and there will be a unity in Christ in holding the head that will come unconsciously as a result of Christ being before each one of our souls.
In chapter four we have aware epifras labor.
Verse 12 Epiphyrasis one of you a servant of Christ, just like he says in the verse you were talking about.
Minister of Christ saluted you, always laboring fervently for you in prayers, that you may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God. That's where his laborers started, and I would guess. And where did they end him up? Bob? We find in the 23rd verse of Philemon he's listed as a fellow prisoner.
Of the apostle Paul in the measure in which we seek to minister Christ and live Christ and hold the head. It's not going to be popular. If we're looking for popularity down here, we're going to be identified with Paul the prisoner of the Lord.
Few more remarks on the importance of recognizing the different ways in which.
Our Lord Jesus Christ, I don't know how else this started. Uh, our large Jesus Christ, which is one of his fuller title names. We have many, many names and titles of that person because of his greatness. But just to notice three of them in this chapter, umm, that are brought before us. The first one in verse 10 that you might walk worthy of the Lord.
When He spoken of his Lord, it has to do with His individual supreme authority over each one of us.
And so if thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in thy heart that God have praised him from the dead, no shall be saved. The apostle Paul, the very first words of his mouth on being converted.
00:25:05
For large, very first word large, what will thou have me to do? Peter in Luke 5, when he is converted there on the boat, he recognized immediately.
We've known him as a person, He'd known Jesus, and he doesn't tell us how long, but obviously for some period of time, but when his soul is really reached.
The uh says Lord.
It's that place into which we individually are brought to recognize his authority over us and so in the 10th verse that we might work worthy of him the Lord, but then when it's the next one that's.
So I want to mention in this chapter has to do with it brings us, it says in verse 13, us into the Kingdom of his dear son, and then we have him further presented to us in, uh, coming into this world.
And the sun, among many things, one of the important ones that it gives emphasis to is that.
God has made himself known to us.
Through his son.
And all that God is for us is fully developed in the sun. Become man.
And so this chapter in his headship is in bringing out to us.
This person, this had over all things all that God is to us, is realized through the person of the sun. The fullness of the Godhead is seen in the sun become man. The fullness of what God is, and the revelation of God and our knowledge of God now and in heaven as well, is through the person of the man who is the Son.
The other, the third one is Christ, which has been spoken about.
And it reverses it. And it's important to, as we read our Bibles and grow a little bit in the knowledge of these things, to recognize that the emphasis, particularly when it's Christ, is what he is to God for us.
What we are to God is what we are in Christ, and so He's the one that presents us to God and makes us what we are.
To God, without being in Christ, we wouldn't have anything really. We wouldn't have any place before God but perfection of our place and our standing and the right that we have through this person who came to do a tremendous work of redemption for us, that he might, we might be complete.
Before God in him. So God is complete in what he is toward us in the sun. We are complete and the fullness of what we have and are before God is seen in that expression in Christ. So Ephraim in the last chapter, his ministry was that they might be perfect and complete where, how? In their enjoyment in their souls of their relationship of what he was for them before God.
So they're those the expressions used or the?
Expressions of himself are very, very important, and the truth that's being emphasized and the use of one or the other.
And it is to walk worthy of the Lord here, isn't it? In Thessalonians, which you mentioned earlier, they were to walk worthy of God. They were babes in Christ. There are a lot of things they didn't know. And so they had turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God and to wait for his Son from heaven.
But here they are to walk worthy of the Lord. In Ephesians, they are to walk worthy of their calling. That's what's brought before them. But it's interesting that the apostle Paul in the ninth verse, before he mentioned walking worthy of the Lord, he too is praying for the Saints.
And he's praying for them in connection with three things that are necessary elements if we're going to walk worthy of the Lord. And his desire was that, first of all, they might be filled with the knowledge of his will, because there has to be a knowledge. And we'll never know his will if we don't know himself, if there isn't a knowledge. And so the apostle Peter, when he ended his ministry, he said grow in grace and the knowledge.
00:30:23
There needs to be a knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, and how are we going to get that knowledge of himself? We've got to open this book every day and read this book. And when you read this book, the Bible, read it to see Christ in, on every page, in every chapter, in every verse, perhaps see Christ, whether it's by type or figure or in the New Testament, the development of the truth and so concerning himself and so on.
And so there needs to be the knowledge and the knowledge of its will. But then it says in all wisdom, I like to very, I like a very simple explanation or definition of the word wisdom. Someone has said that wisdom is the skill for living. You know, people might have a lot of knowledge, but there might not be a lot of wisdom to take that knowledge and apply it in a proper way. Often told about how I had to take a shot to get out of junior high.
And I opted for woodworking. And I could write, I could get the knowledge. But when I went to put it in practice, if you ever saw what I made, you'd say, why, Jim, you didn't have the wisdom to take the knowledge from the diagram of the thing you were supposed to make and to utilize it in the proper way. And so it takes wisdom then, and that wisdom is from above. And if we ask, he'll give wisdom to all men that he giveth to all men liberally and afraid of not, and so on. But then there's something else.
It's their spiritual understanding. You know, we read back in the Old Testament, I think it's in First Chronicles 12, that the children of Issachar were men that had not just knowledge of the time, but they had understanding of the time. In other words, they were able to take the knowledge they had and use it in a wise way in the circumstances of the day in which they found themselves.
And just go back. I'll just read it, but you might want to turn just to implant it in our mind because there were 3-4 men back in the book of Daniel. And you have in this same order that it's listed here that Paul prays for. Here you have the same three things in connection with these four men, Daniel, of course, and his three friends, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Just notice the 17th verse of the first chapter of Daniel.
As for these four children, God gave them, notice this knowledge. That's the first thing. Everything else is going to be based on the knowledge we know. But then it says and skill in all learning and wisdom. You see, there was skill involved in taking that knowledge and using it in a proper way. And then it says, and Daniel had understanding in all visions and dreams. And we know later on when Daniel went in to stand before the king.
That the Lord gave him not just the knowledge and the wisdom, but the understanding of the circumstances in which he found himself to answer the King in a proper way.
And so these three things are very important if we're going to walk worthy of the Lord and if we are going to practically hold the headship of Christ. And the result, if you just allow me to note, to point out what follows the statement in our chapter, it says in verse 10 unto all pleasing, there's three things that follow here, three things that are prerequisite, but there's three things I believe that follow here.
That is, under all pleasing.
Being fruitful in every good work and then growing, if you know Mr. Darby's translation, growing by the knowledge of God. There's growth and so maybe some others have some constantly, but again, 3 prerequisites to walking worthy. And then when we do walk worthy, there's going to be a pleasing and a fruitfulness.
And a growth that can only come again by holding the head.
I'd just like to give up an A.
Implication for perhaps some of the young people.
00:35:04
When I started, uh, the printing trade, it was about after 20 years that computers came in and I had to learn the trade all over again, but even harder because I wasn't controlling it. The computer was. And the information, when I fed it to the computer, that's what the computer did, and I had a hard time.
Adjusting and my foreman said that.
You know, by testimony, you know, as a Christian and I had a hard time trying to grasp the concept of the computers working with the machine. And he says, Carl, he says he showed me the, uh, the big book of all the instructions on these systems, Carl, he says your Bible.
So when it kind of hit home to me, he says, you know, when I was a Christian, but this is my Bible. I have to learn it and I have to know what through and through, and I have to apply it. Now, if I didn't read it, if I didn't apply it, I wouldn't be running the machine.
It's a simplification in the in the Christian life.
This is the word of God. This is This is the Bible. This is our instruction book.
If we learn it, if we study it, and if we practice it, you get results.
It took me a while to learn that book. It was quite thick and there's a lot of things I didn't understand. And eventually I mastered it and I was able to control it the way it should be. But the point I'm getting at is because my foreman said this is my Bible. It made me think, yes, I have to, I have to learn this what this big book, book of instructions and how to run the press. But you know, it made me think of.
You know, if we can apply this to ourselves and say if we have the word of God, if we study it, if we learn about it to the sense that you can understand that you're the Holy Spirit.
Then you have the knowledge of what the Word says in the Holy Spirit. It's just a simple illustration, but something I have to learn after my.
Just a practical commentary, maybe more from the younger.
Uh, almost or older, lived much of A lifetime and maybe haven't learned it very well. Umm.
But there's a common saying in the world if all else fails.
Drive the instruction manual.
And sometimes we try to live the Christian life that way and it doesn't work.
Sometimes we smell a little bit. We sit in reading meetings and.
Sunday school and so on. And so when it comes to daily living, we tend to rely on our own imagination, our own thoughts, our own something. Anyways, we try this, we try that and sometimes it doesn't go very well in our lives. And we say, well, I maybe I better see what God has to say about the subject. And so all else will say has failed. And we we go to the instruction manual. But the true way.
The true way.
Is get to know God.
And when we get to know God, and that's the first priority, when through His Son, then it will form our thoughts and our hearts.
To act according to what He is and what his heart is. We don't know God immediately, all that we're going to know of God. But when you want to know somebody, you spend time with them.
You study, if you will, the life of the Lord Jesus and the Word of God that presents this person, and through it the true knowledge of God resides.
In his proper place, not in her head.
The true knowledge of God resides in the heart. The true understanding of God is through the heart, because we don't know God if we only know him in the sense of the philosopher who says he's all powerful and all knowing and all this and all that.
That's a description of them, but that's some of His attributes. It's true, but it doesn't give us the true knowledge of Himself. God is love, and if we don't know His heart as love, we don't know Him. God is light, and if we don't morally enter into the truth of His Holiness, and we don't enter into those things in our intellect, we recognize the heart of God and the holiness of God.
00:40:22
Through our hearts and consciences and we need to grow little by little to come to know him. There may be many things that these reading meetings that someone's going to say that went right over my head, and maybe it will. And yet at the same thing, there needs to be a developed thirst in the soul to get to know.
Increased by the true knowledge of God.
That will be learned in the heart as to His character and His person, and when we learn it, what will be a practical result of it? We will appreciate in our measure His Son. We will find our delight in His Son as He does. We will give the Son the Christ, the preeminent place that He gives the Son and the Christ.
Such that would average any point of reference in our lives. We'll have the practical results of looking ahead to the sun, but it's only as in a practical sense as we gradually, not instantly, but gradually come to know and grow by the true knowledge of God.
But there may be some here saying, you know, we've sat in this reading meeting and we've talked about these wonderful things, but life is a daily grind and how can we really go on and practically carry out these things? And if you just allow me to point out in verse eleven of our chapter, there are four more things in connection with walking worthy, or as you say said, Don, having the knowledge of God and having the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ and knowing him.
Strengthened with all might. The word literally means empowered. You want power for your pathway. There is power. There's all the power that is necessary. You know Paul, when he prayed for the Saints and various epistles, he never prayed that they would have more power. What he did pray for was that they would utilize the power that they did have. The power is all there at our disposal.
And so strengthened are empowered with all might according to his glorious powers. That same power that is his is our is the power that's available to you and me to get through life today, whether we live here in lackadaisical North America or we live in Egypt where our brethren are facing.
Situations that we know nothing about, or whether it's those who are in prison being tortured and facing martyrdom.
We're empowered. And then he says unto all patients or endurance. It does take endurance, doesn't it? It's not the Sprint, it's not the 100 yard dash. It's what the marathon runner has to learn when he's training. And that is endurance and then long-suffering. It takes a lot of long-suffering, doesn't it? And if we're going to go on and on the head and as members of the body of Christ here and go through the circumstances of life and our interactions with other members of the body of Christ.
It's gonna take long-suffering.
With just grinding our teeth and trying to get through. No brethren, with joyfulness, we. These things are possible, not just with.
Swearing our backs and shouldering the load. But as Paul said in the midst of his suffering, sorrowful, yet always rejoicing. So it's very practical, but.
We talk about a lot of things, as Don said, a lot of things that may go over our heads, but this is very practical. This is, as a brother used to tell us when we were younger, where the rubber meets the road. You say, is it possible to carry these things out practically today? All the resources are there, brethren. The resources that you and I have in Christ this afternoon to live this out in 2013 are the same powerful and mighty and limitless resources that have always been available to the people of God and will be always available.
00:45:02
Until the body of Christ and all believers are raptured safe home.
Verse nine it speaks about the knowledge of His will.
And verse 10 it is the knowledge of God.
I like to think rather than that in the Old Testament, the focus under the law was on what man was.
And it resulted in complete failure. It resulted with man crucifying the Messiah.
The go their their God and hanging them on the cross.
God said, in effect, when that happened, that's the end of the first creation. As far as God's concerned, it was complete failure.
Then God turns around at the cross and begins to show us who he is. And that's what characterizes Christianity. It's who God is. And so it's increasing in the knowledge of God. Peter, at the end of his epistle says grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And that's something we continue to do all through our lives. And you know it, really.
His searching When you look around in the world we live in, the focus in our culture is so much on who we are.
And I get to know who I am. I'm establishing my own identity here in this world. And it's emptiness, it's a deceit. It's, it's something that deceives. And I, I feel sorry for the young people who think that getting to know who they are is the end of life. That is not it. It's getting to know who God is. And you won't understand life as it is meant to be until you get to know who God is.
What kind of a God do we have? And that's a life long learning process. The Lord help us to grow in the knowledge of God. Oh brethren, what a glorious, what a great God we have. Whether it's in as we have in the verses they follow, we don't have time for it now, but whether it's in the first creation, the tremendous display of the power of God, the wisdom of God in the first creation.
Or whether it's a new creation, God manifests his glory, His wisdom is his love, His power in every way possible. And so it's getting to know God. And in the nature that you know God, every other relationship will take its proper place. Only then in the measure that we know God.
This might make a comment here. I know our time is gone, but just for the encouragement of maybe some of the of the younger ones here. Uh, because God worked in your heart and gave you a desire to be here with the Word of God open and under the influence and the sound of the word of God. You are in the process right now of the Spirit of God making these things good to your, to your soul. You, you are working towards the end of being.
Filled.
With the knowledge of God and what is taking place in these meetings is God working in your soul to give you a greater knowledge of Him? It says in Darby's translation, it says growing in the knowledge of God. Well, you sitting here in this meeting right now is giving the Spirit of God the ability to take the word of God having you under its influence.
And causing you to step by step a little bit line upon line growing in your Christian experience and in the knowledge of God to take heart. You may have heard a lot of things in this meeting that you think went over your head. Well, the Spirit of God has it to to to make good to your soul. So we those of us that are older would like to thank you for.
Being here so that you could be influenced by that which will give you the ability to grow in the knowledge of God.
00:50:58
32 The person of the Christ unfolding every grace, 132.
Nsnoise, Grace.
Nsnoise.